


Mama Hen

by Forlorn Kumquat (sara_wolfe)



Category: Avengers Academy (Video Game)
Genre: Fluff, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-25
Updated: 2017-02-25
Packaged: 2018-09-26 19:48:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,092
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9919541
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sara_wolfe/pseuds/Forlorn%20Kumquat
Summary: Tony's the mama hen of Avengers Academy. He just doesn't know it, yet.





	

Tony isn’t quite sure how it all started. If you asked anyone, absolutely anyone, they’d say he’d be the last person on Earth - hell, in the entire galaxy - who should be mentoring younger kids. Cap, yes - Steve was the perfect person to mentor the younger superheroes. Jan had that sunshiney personality. Even Natasha with her gruff demeanor was better with people than he was.

And yet somehow Tony is the one with the kids following him around campus like a gaggle of baby chickens.

_(”Clutch, Tony. A group of baby chickens is called a clutch.” “Thanks, Birdbrain, totally the important part, there.”)_

– a clutch of baby chickens, then.

_(”Which makes you the mama hen.” “Shut up, Wilson.”)_

Sam had probably been the first. He’d been the youngest person on campus when he first arrived and while he’d hit it off with Jan, Loki and Nat had been another matter. He and Tony had bonded over tinkering with the EX-O wings, bonded over a mutual love of engineering (and Sam’s mom’s cookies). And even now, Sam will still come into the Tower at the oddest hours to talk tech tweaks and raid Tony’s cheese fridge.

Kamala was next. It hadn’t been tech with her; instead, she’d cornered Tony one afternoon and solemnly informed him that she’d found his ‘James Barnes as Captain America’ AU fic on some small corner of the internet where he’d been completely positive that no one would find out his true identity. (Almost completely positive.) Tony had been afraid, then, that Kamala was going to show his story to the other students on campus, make him the Academy laughingstock, but she’d surprised him by eagerly asking for more fic, wanting to read more of his work. In return, she’d shown him her own writing, and now, more than half the time they have a joint “training session”, they’re secretly camped out in the Tower, binging on junk food and reading their favorite fics out loud.

_(”Everyone knows what you’re doing, Tony. ‘Storytime with Iron Man and Ms Marvel’ isn’t nearly as secret as you think.”)_

Peter practically moved into the Tower within hours of coming to the Academy. He spent almost as much times in Tony’s labs as Tony did, the bots following him around like a bunch of overeager puppies. And when he wasn’t working on his own experiments, he was dragging the other Spiderlings over. Tony had probably collected an entire blanket’s worth of webbing after the kids were done crawling all over the Tower.

_(”You know that stuff disintegrates if you leave it alone long enough, right?” “Yeah, tell me that again after you’ve walked face-first into a wall of the stuff at three in the morning when AIM’s attacking.” “Ew.” “Exactly.”)_

Doreen had first approached him for a suit of armor for a _squirrel_ , of all things. Tony had been so intrigued by the idea that he hadn’t slept for three days while he worked on it. The end result had been awesome, if he did say so, and he felt a little jolt of pride every time he saw Tippy Toe zipping around campus alongside Doreen’s helicopter.

_(”That squirrel almost ran me over in midair the other day.” “Hey, you know better than to hog all the airspace.”)_

And Tony had honestly never expected this to be his life. But there wasn’t a day, now, when he didn’t have at least one person in his tower, raiding his fridge, playing catch with the bots, bugging him at all hours of the day and night with questions–

Teddy blinked in surprise as Tony suddenly broke off, mid-sentence, and hightailed it across the room to where Peter was poking at a frantically-beeping computer terminal. They were talking softly about something, Tony with an arm around Peter’s hunched shoulders as he worked at the computer.

“So, is storytime over?” Teddy asked, curiously, turning his attention back to Sam.

“Probably,” Sam told him, chuckling. “Once Tony and Peter get started on that computer, it’ll be a while before they remember to come up for air.”

“When you brought us here,” Billy spoke up, “you said that Tony would try to dissuade us from coming around. But, that didn’t sound like what he was trying to do.”

“Yeah, Tony’s got this idea that he’s a bad influence on you younger kids,” Sam said. “So he tries to warn you guys off, but he’s really, really bad at it. Mostly, everyone just wants to spend even more time with him. And he loves having the Tower full of people. Probably even more than we all love coming over here.”

“So, when you said that we could come over any time we wanted-”

“I’m pretty sure Tony doesn’t sleep,” Sam replied, a sentiment quickly confirmed by JARVIS. “And believe me, there’s nothing more fun than a midnight cheese fridge raid.”

“That’s the third time someone’s mentioned this cheese fridge,” Teddy said. “Just how amazing is this thing?”

“It has to be seen to be believed,” Sam told him.

“Well, then, let’s go see it,” Billy said, jumping up from the couch. “After everything we’ve seen in this universe, I want to see this legendary cheese fridge.”

“If you three are raiding my cheese fridge,” Tony called over, suddenly, “bring me and Peter some. We’re hungry.”

“Didn’t think you were listening,” Sam replied, walking over to join him and Peter.

“I’m always listening,” Tony told him. “And thanks,” he added, softly, when Sam got closer. “I didn’t realize that people actually-”

He trailed off, but Sam could hear everything he wasn’t saying.

“We love you, you dork,” Sam replied. “We wouldn’t have an Academy if it wasn’t for you.”

“I didn’t do anything,” Tony protested, but Sam had his wings, and a whole robot suit, and dozens of other pieces of tech that said otherwise. And he knew everyone on campus could say the same thing.

“Thanks, anyway,” he said, seriously. To change the subject, he nodded at the kids gathered in Tony’s kitchenette, chatting animatedly as they piled food on the counters. “Looks like the new kids are settling in well.”

“Yeah, because more people in my Tower is exactly what I need,” Tony groused, his words belied by the smile on his face as he watched them. “Next thing you know, Doreen’s going to bring the squirrels to meet the new ones, and the rest of the Spiderlings, and-”

“And you love it,” Sam interrupted him.

Tony was silent for a moment and then, “Yeah,” he admitted, “I really do.”


End file.
